i want to make love to his voice.

A brief biography of Abraham Lincoln

I love Maira Kalman almost as much (maybe more...) as the late Tibor Kalman

my indie heart is a flutterin'

Gosh I love her.
You can get the song off of her album with M. Ward. She & Him is the name of their little duo.

Nuff' said.

I read on Gawker that they are making a remake. Uncool Hollywood. Uncool.

As seen on stephmodo's blog:

A 100 meter photograph taken in Berlin...the photo consists of 178 different people on the same railroad bridge but on different days. 20 in fact.

“Mr. Gorbachev, tear down this wall!”
These are the most famous of Ronald Reagan’s remarks at the Brandenburg Gate in West Berlin, Germany on June 12, 1987. Now, more than two decades later, these words need to be repeated, not to the Soviet Union but to the United States Congress regarding the Secure Fence Act.

On Oct 26, 2006, the Secure Fence Act was enacted by Congress to try “to establish operational control over the international land and maritime borders of the United States.” Hardly a fence, the border wall fails to decrease the number of immigrants who are in the United States illegally, according to a report commissioned by Congress.

We need to cease this $46 billion security blanket that has failed to gain control of the border, or, lets be honest, take attention away the failures in Iraq. Now, with Bush out of office, and the wall continuing to use up taxpayer dollars, congress needs to reconsider building this not-so-white picket fence.

The idea of throwing a wall up between two countries, which is what it sounds like to those who don’t have the time to read the whole bill, is an unintelligent solution that presents the USA as scared and irrational. It is a simple-minded answer that doesn’t fix the problem.

This new wall is blazing through communities, creating division and impacts on the culture and environment of border towns. According to the CRS Report for Congress, updated in June 2007, the border fence has had little impact on overall apprehensions in California and Arizona, where the largest stretch of fence has been completed.

Yesterday, KGVR, a local TV station, reports stated that the border wall will cut off water pumping stations along the Rio Grande valley. This is just one of many changes to which the wall is forcing border town communities to adhere.

There does seem to be some positive impact to the border fence. On Oct. 15, 2008 the U.S. Border Patrol Tucson Sector reported that agents were able to save 443 illegal aliens from possible death after being abandoned by their smugglers, during fiscal year 2008, while reducing the number of deaths by 17 percent from 202 in fiscal year 2007 to 167 in fiscal year 2008. Nonetheless, it doesn’t seem like the initiative is designed to save lives.
While US Border patrol stand around talking on their cell phones, munching snacks and hoping to catch at least a few migrant workers in action, US tax dollars are being wasted.

Taxpayers for Common Sense, after visiting Brownsville in May 2008 to investigate the fence, estimates that the costs of building and maintaining the fence could prove astronomical, ranging "from $300 million to $1.7 billion per mile, depending on materials."

A 700-mile wall at $3 billion (which is the lowest price estimate) per mile adds up to $2.1 billion. This money, which is not delivering an answer to the problem of illegal immigration, should be used to pay off federal debt or help fund President Obama’s American Recovery and Reinvestment Plan.

The land of the free...

Complete isolation from the world, confined in a small cell with an opaque window covered with plastic, separation from loved ones, newspapers, magazines, books, radio and television. Residing in a cell that contains only a steel bed, a sink and a toilet. This must be hell. This must be in a barbarian country - maybe an Afghan prison. This certainly wouldn’t happen in America. Right? Wrong.

Ali Saleh Kahlah al-Marri, the last “enemy combatant” incarcerated in America, has been (barely) living in the U.S. Naval Consolidated Brig in Charelston, South Carolina. A citizen of Quitar who was studying at Bradley University in Peoria, Illinois, he was incarcerated for being an alleged Al-Qaeda sleeper agent. His conditions are appalling.

According to al-Marri’s complaint, when was interrogated, government officials threatened he would be sent to Egypt or Saudi Arabia, where they told him he would be tortured and sodomized and his wife would be raped in front of him.

The living conditions and threats are only the beginning of the assortment of human rights issues connected to al-Marri’s case. Two months after arriving in America with his family on September 10, 2001, al-Marri was arrested as a material witness in connection with the 9/11 attacks. When he was on the verge of trial in June 2003, President Bush ordered that he be incarcerated and held indefinitely.

If this can happen, can an American civilian be arrested and taken from his home and family at the request of a president?

In August of 2005 al-Marri filed a lawsuit, a lower court affirmed the government’s right to detain him indefinitely and after several appeals the Supreme Court is scheduled to hear his case in April. The Court requires that the Obama Administration file a reply to challenge by March 23rd.

In his memorandum, filed on January 22, 2009, President Obama stated that it is “in the interests of the United States that the executive branch undertake a prompt and thorough review of the factual and legal basis for al-Marri's continued detention, and identify and thoroughly evaluate alternative dispositions.

The Supreme Court needs to come up with a legal theory for what to do with al-Marri, because keeping him in custody as an enemy combatant is inhumane and unconstitutional.
Marri is being treated like a soldier of war and the Supreme Court needs to ask if he should be treated like a civilian. Is a war on terror indeed a war? Al-Marri’s detention far from armed conflict separates him from the laws of war. The court needs to rule that indefinite executive detention is illegal and al-Marri should be classified as a civilian, not an enemy combatant, allowing that he either be charged with crimes or released.

In a call for the Fourth Circuit Court of Appeals to reverse al-Marri’s affirmation of military detention, the New York Times wrote, “People accused of bad deeds should be tried in court – not in sham proceedings. They should be put in jail – not secret detention.”

Brilliant.

The New Yorker gets my humor.

I love junior high girls

Tonight I had Young Life campaigners with Junior high girls. We did this discussion from my old 80's teen study Bible. They loved it! I didn't expect it but God can do more than we expect. So can the neon colors of the 80's. Clearly. Anyway, I love my girls and this post is very lighthearted but praise God for giving me some love for kids even after doing it for 3.5 years of college.

For class I had to take pictures of strangers and get really close to them. Much closer and it would have gotten awkward.

Shoppers score quirky deals

City-Wide Garage Sale offers bargains from tins to statues

By MK Butler

Published: Monday, January 28, 2008

Updated: Friday, January 9, 2009

Photo by: Elizabeth Moskowitz

John Hudson awaits customers at the Austin City-Wide Garage Sale in the Palmer Events Center Saturday afternoon. The statue (center) of Saint Isidoro dates back to the early 18th century and was on sale for $4,600.

Three men analyze the purchase of an old record player, and a woman heaves a candy-ball machine onto a cart.

It's Austin's modern-day treasure hunt.

Considered by some to be Austin's best-kept secret, the City-Wide Garage Sale attracted crowds of bargain hunters to the Palmer Events Center over the weekend. The event opened at 10 a.m. on Saturday, though for five extra dollars on the $10 admission price, shoppers could start bargain hunting at 8:30 a.m.

Bargain hunter Sammie Dwyer, founder of the sale, had an idea to centralize garage sales when gas prices peaked in the 1970s. The business venture now belongs to Christopher Dwyer, Sammie's son, who was 12 at the first garage sale in March 1977.

"Austin has an eclectic taste, and because it is a younger, more savvy, artistic group, we'll get people selling things that they won't sell at the other shows," Dwyer said.

Like condom tins. One particular collector took advantage of what Dwyer calls the "city-wide search engine," a tool that bargain hunters use to announce their items. "That was a tricky announcement to make. I think I used the word 'prophylactic,'" Dwyer said.

Vendors, who must apply for their booths, tote everything from Hank Aaron baseball cards to old-fashioned Coke machines.

Exhibitor Judy Zipp, for example, sold old cuff links, Avon collectables, Hollywood cigarette holders and pipes and other antique trinkets. "My deal is passing on history while also making a little money," Zipp said. "I try to tell the story that goes with the items."

Even a false fire alarm that went off during the day could not kill participants' enthusiasm. Buyers and sellers evacuated then continued the day in good spirits.

"Gave me a chance to smoke a cigarette," Robert Alvarado chuckled as he returned to his booth.

Alvarado's booth included the most expensive item at this year's show, a, three-foot tall statue of Saint Isidoro with a price tag of $4,600.

On the other end of the price spectrum, tables at the "Booth of Miracles" were piled 5 feet high with old scarves, quilts, coats and vintage clothing priced at $10 and under.

"It makes perfect sense for us to find high-quality items for a fraction of what they would be new with the hard times in the economy right now," Barbara Nagel said.

Nagel, who is on her 12th year of selling at the show, remembers that most of the shoppers were students when the garage sale was held in the Austin Coliseum, between 1977 and 2002. Shoppers on Saturday ranged from

designers and prop masters to eBay sellers and collectors.

"I'm furnishing my apartment," said Ashley Brown, an Austin Community College student who just moved to Austin. "This is a one-stop shop that doesn't cost too much."

Oren Lavie - Her Morning Elegance
Uploaded by IgnitionVM

my new love

I want to buy this beautiful camera.
Love of my life.
It will match with my bike.

the littlest birds sing the prettiest songs..

I am not a nun. I've never been to a convent but I'd like to visit one. Heck, I'm not even Catholic. I just get asked all the time - thanks, Mom. I am, however, a follower of Jesus. He is the one true God and He changed my life. I wouldn't know the beauty and joy in this world - if it weren't for my Savior, I wouldn't know how to love.

I love pretty things, bicycles, the outdoors and music.

"No Christian has ever been known to recant on his death bed." - M. Ward.

I do graphic design and I write. We'll see how it goes...